AAdvantage Members Waited 5 Hours On Hold For Help As New Status Year Came To A Close

by Gary Leff

Traditionally U.S. airline elite status was earned during one calendar year, to be enjoyed the next year. There’d be some overlap – status from one year would last through February of the next year to give a program time to mail out new membership cards and update systems. In many cases that grace period was cut back, to January or even to no grace period at all.

American Airlines tried something new. Along with changing what counts towards earning status – their new Loyalty Points include not just flying but credit card spending, online shopping, and myriad other mileage-earning activities – they changed their status-earning year.

  • Status is earned based on activity from March through February
  • This gives customers plenty of time for Christmas shopping to count towards status, and doesn’t require focusing on status at end of year when customers are distracted with holiday and familial obligations, they say
  • Status lasts through March 31, a one-month grace period following the end of the qualifying year.

With the window shutting to earn status for the new year closing on Tuesday night, customers were calling in. This is a new system (Loyalty Points) and a new cutoff (February 28, not December 31). And telephone hold times became excruciating, as numerous customers shared to social media. Wait times stretched in some cases over 5 hours.

So why would people be calling American AAdvantage Customer Service at the end of the status-earning year?

  • They might be concerned about miles that haven’t posted. This can be dealt with post-February 28! The miles from prior status-earning year should be posted based on their original transaction date, retroactively, qualifying for status. Of course if those miles never post a person might want to make a ‘safety transaction’ prior to end of year.

  • They might not be sure how to get themselves over the hump. It’s a new earning system and so they’d need to know, “can I just buy something online through the portal today, and will that still count?” It’s best to purchase something where the transaction consummates instantly rather than where a physical product ships later, in order to ensure the transaction date for miles is on February 28!

  • They might wonder whether there’s a grace for coming close to a status level. For instance, you might be at 199,500 Loyalty Points and wonder whether you’ll receive Executive Platinum which normally requires 200,000.

It’s not surprising to see a year-end rush for a new system, with members paying attention at the last minute. We should all pay attention before the final day!

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. I easily requalified a couple months ago, woke up this morning to the updated account website and app. Looks nifty, but mostly just reorganized. They still really haven’t brought their call hold times back to pre-pandemic levels. Reservations used to be regularly instant for the Executive Platinum desk, now my median is probably somewhere around 10 minutes, with one or two outliers going out to 30+ minutes in the past few weeks. For a while there last year, they were definitely having issues ramping call center staff back up, but at this point the problem seems like just a straight-up COVID cost cut.

  2. Congratulations, you’ve achieved Executive Platinum status. Welcome to being number 103 on the upgrade list because EVERYONE else played the same game.

    Your Executive Platinum status is as useful as Hilton’s Diamond status when staying anywhere in America.

    But fear not, today is March 1st and you can start working hard at achieving Executive Platinum status for next year. It should be a bit more fruitful in 2024 as some will choose not to play the game.

    They will have realized that a good amount of their time (and money) was a waste last year as they make peace with the fact that when everyone has status…………

  3. The main thing to pay attention to is how much AA has gutted their loyalty program, demoralized their employees and just generally slid from first to worst among the legacies. I let my 12 year streak of EXP status expire last night and have already been enjoying being a free agent. I’m sure I’ll still partake in their ScowlShip class service when it meets my constraints but I’m definitely not going out of my way to do so.

  4. Complaining about 5 hour holds when calling at the last possible moment about status points?

    Reminds me of that quote: “Poor planning on your part does not necessitate an emergency on mine.”

  5. It was very clear about the program dates, more whining from people who are just to dumb to read or go online. Tired of these social media whores going out of the way to complain and if you read between the lines, it’s their ignorance and waiting to the last minute that is the issue.

  6. AA flew the program into the ground years ago. And yet there are still people going through the wreckage looking for scrap parts. It’s just not worth it anymore. RIP Aadvantage.

  7. 20 Bucks says the majority of those people making last-minute panic calls were trying to make sure they cleared Gold.

  8. All the airline (& hotel) programs have been gutted. Was AA Plat then COVID and did not fly for over a yr. no longer choose a airline based on loyalty points/benefits-if any. Now it schedule, price, equipment. Usually fly BC international & premium ( or whatever it’s being called these days) on short domestic flights (<-4 hrs). Multiple cc give me lounge & checked bags .Sorry airlines but as you decided that my loyalty wasn't worth it to you I've decided ditto.

  10. 5 hour hold at AA? That is GOOD! They should feel lucky. My record on hold with AA is 13 hours, and the first thing that the agent wanted to do is spend 10 minutes arguing that I had not been on hold for 13 hours, even though my phone’s call counter was racking up the seconds and is impossible of lying. It seems like a 8-9 hour hold wait is fairly common. If you go for the callback option, expect that call only at 3am, because that’s when they send them through hoping that they will fail to reach you.

    AA has despicable customer service. They have gone out of their way for years to show deep disdain for people that provide them revenue.

  11. I always select the callback option during my calls to AAdvantage. Not sure why had to hold for hours unless the first person couldn’t help and was forced to transfer to someone else with long hold time!

  12. So I’m demoted this year because despite my boarding pass showing my AA# BA posted one of two legs of the trip to my BA account not my AA one and nobody will fix it.

    So frustrating.

  15. Yeah, so this whole article/social media posts are incredibly annoying. People had 15 months to qualify and even longer to READ T&C’s. Plus, just an FYI: CC spending only counts from the date your statement closed. AA will not post additional LP’s from March’s statement on the previous year. AA & Citi have been very clear on this point. We had 2 Christmas Shopping statements on this year’s requirements, we should all be grateful. Figure it out people.

  16. I’m sorry but please explain what AA loyalty gets you other than slightly more bonus “miles”. The whole “upgrade” offing is just a marketing tool since FC is already full on most of their jets with paying customers. Don’t count on being upgraded unless you see a pig fly by.

    BTW, this also applies to Delta and all the others. Status means nothing other than bragging rights to …nothing

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